Ignition device for internal-combustion engines.



G. H. GERE.

IGNITION DEVICE FOR INTERNAL COMBUSTION ENGINES.

APPLICATION TILED APE.16, 1913.

1,099,496, Patented June 9, 1914.

9 llllmmlh. in mmmllll UNITED STATES PATENT oEEIoE.

GEORGE H. GERE, 0F NEWARK, NEW JERSEY.

IGNITION DEVICE FOR INTERNAL-COMBUSTION ENGINES.

Application filed April 16, 1913.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, GEORGE H. GERE, a citizen of the United States,residing at Newark, in the county of Essex and State of New Jersey, haveinvented certain new and useful Improvements in Ignition Devices forInternal Combustion Engines; and I do hereby declare the following to bea full, clear, and exact description of the invention, such as willenable others skilled in the art to which it appertains to make and usethe same, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, and tofigures of reference marked thereon, which form a part of thisspecification.

This invention relates to ignition apparatus for internal combustionengines and more especially to the devices for making electricalcontacts included in such ignition apparatus.

The contact making devices, according to my invention, comprise a memberwhich is actuated preferably from the engine crank shaft, so as to begiven a continuously recurring movement in a fixed path during the rangeof action of the piston in which the cylinder charge may be ignited whentheengine is run either in forward or reverse direction, that is to say,in the two-cycle engine, in connection with which one form of myinvention is shown in the accompanying drawings, during a portion of thecompression and power strokes. The .movement of such member at othertimes is, of course, immaterial, as it is not called upon to perform itsfunction of making contact to close the electrical circuit, exceptwithin the range of piston movement referred to. Such member may, forexample, be given a recurrent movement in a fixed path during such rangeof piston movement, by giving it a movement of rotation, as from theengine shaft, and in such case such contact member will recurrentlytraverse a fixed path during its entire movement, but it may be mountedand actuated in other ways so long as it travels recurrently a fixedpath corresponding to the range of piston movement during which thecharge is to be ignited. I may refer to such contact member as therecurrently moving contact member. The remaining contact member, whichis adapted to co-act with the recurrently moving contact member, isarranged adjacent to the fixed path of travel thereof above referred to..Such contact member ordinarily during the operation of Specification ofLetters Patent.

contact member.

Patented June 9, 1914.

Serial No. 761,483.

the engine is stationary relative to the recurrentl moving contactmember. By reason of t is fact, and in order to distinguish 1t from therecurrently moving contact member I may refer to it generally as thelocal contact member. Such local contact member may be actuated in suchmanner as to break its contact with the recurrently movlng contactmember and immediately .thereafterto make contact therewith at adifferent point in the fixed path of travel of the recurrentlv movingmember, and for this reason I shall have occasion to refer to it asalternately engaging the recurrently moving The local contact member mayalso preferably be shifted relatively to the recurrently movable contactmember to advance or retard the interval of contact and thereby thetimin of the spark, and for this reason I may re or to it as a shiftingcontact member. I may also provide means for locking the local contactmember in any desired position within the range through which it may beshifted to advance or retard the time of making contact, such lockingmeans being especially useful to prevent accldental change of positionwhere the shifting movement is performed manually.

One form of apparatus in accordance with my invention is illustrated inthe accompanying drawing, in which- Figure 1 is a face view of asparking apparatus mounted on an engine and involving one form of myinvention. Fig. 2 is a side view of the sparking device shown in Fig. 1.Fig. 3 is a detail illustrating the positions of the parts of thesparking apparatus when the engine is reversed, and Fig. 4 is adiagrammatic view showing one form of arrangement of electricalconnectionsv for my improved sparking apparatus.

I illustrate in the. drawing an engine 10 having a shaft '11 which isdriven in the usual way by a piston operating in the cylinder of theengine, the piston in turn bein connected to a crank on the shaft 11.This detail is not shown because it is common to internal combustionengines.

To secure an explosion in the internal combustion engine, when thechargeis compressed by the piston on its compression stroke, a suitablesparking device, as a sparlnplug 12 (Fig. 4) is placed in a suitableposition in the cylinder, the spark-plug being connected, by a wire 13,to a spark-coil 14:, the spark-coil being connected, by the wire 15, tothe engine which forms aground for the circuit, and a wire 16, from theplug through the battery 17 and through the switch 18, is led to theimproved contact device which forms the subject-matter of thisinvention. The contact device is constructed to make a contact throughthe sparking circuit so that a spark is caused at a predetermined timeto explode the mixture that has been compressed by the piston and forcethe piston down on its power stroke. If the spark is caused after thecompression and when the piston is beginning to descend, the engine willrun in one direction; I will assume it to be in the forward direction.When the engine is running well the spark, of course, may be advancedthrough a limited range as is usual. If, however, at any time in therotation of the engine, the spark is caused in the mixture before thepiston has sufficiently advanced upon its compression stroke to becarried over the center by its momentum, the piston is forced downbefore the crank has gone over the center, and the direction of therotation of the engine is re versed. The present invention is designedto bring about the reversing of the engine by means of the sparkingdevices with positiveness and certainty.

The recurrently moving contact member is designated by the numeral 19.Such contact member is shown as mounted in the circular insulation disk20, and such disk may be of any preferred insulating material asporcelain, fiber, or the like. The disk 20 and the contact member 19borne thereby may be directly connected to the engine shaft 11 and mayrotate therewith. The contact member 19 is grounded as by being broughtinto contact with the shaft 11.

The local contact member 25 is mounted upon a support by which it issupported adjacent to the recurrently moving contact member 19, and suchsupport may comprise a ring 21 mounted on the engine boss 38 concentricwith the shaft 11. The local contact member 25, as shown, comprises twoseparated contact points 26 and 27 and is carried by the ring 21 in suchmanner as to be insulated therefrom. In the form shown, the ring 21 isprovided with an upward ex tension 22 to which is secured a plate orstrip of insulating material 23, upon which the contact member 25,preferably constructed in the form of a yoke, as shown, is pivotallymounted substantially mid-way between the contact points 26 and 27. Theinsulating plate 23 carries the plate 24 which in turn carries the meansfor turning or swinging the contact member 25 upon its pivot and forlocking the same in place, and in the form shown, such turning andlocking means comprise the link 28 pivotally secured to the contactmember 25 at one side of the pivotal mounting thereof, and containing aninsulating portion 29, said link being connected, at its opposite end,to a handle 30 which is pivoted. to the plate 2 1 at 31. Projecting fromthe boss 32 f the handle 30 is a nose 33 which engages a head 34 on arod 35, the rod 35 sliding in the bearing 36, and the head 34 of saidrod being projected away from said bearing 36 by means of a spring 37.It will be seen that when the handle 30 is operated, the head 34 ispressed down, and when the nose 33 passes over its center, the headassists in completing the movement of the handle and also looks thehandle 30 and the local contact member 25 in adjusted position andagainst accidental shifting or rocking. The local contact member 25 thusalternately engages the recurrently moving contact 19 at differentpoints when it is rocked upon its pivot by means of the handle 30,causing a quick change of the place of contact between it and therecurrently moving contact 19 by bringing its contact point 27 intoco-acting relation with the recurrently moving contact 19 in place ofthe contact point 26, or vice versa. It will thus be seen that when theextension 22 of the ring 21 is vertical and the disk 20 is so arrangedon the shaft 11 that the engagement between the contacts takes place,for instance, as in Fig. 1, the contact member 19 has movedapproximately thirty degrees from the vertical in the direction of thearrow (4, the arrow indicating the forward direction of rotation of theshaft 11. I will assume that when this contact. takes place the pistonhas completed its compression stroke and has been carried over by thefiy-wheel so that it is a short distance on its power stroke, that is,if the contact 19 has moved thirty degrees from the vertical, and thepiston was at the limit of its compression stroke when the contact 19was vertical, the piston has traveled on its power stroke substantiallyone-sixth of its distance of travel when the contact is made and thespark and the resulting explosion occurs. It will thus be readilyunderstood that so long as the engine moves in the direction of arrow(1, the recurring contact and explosion keeps the engine running, thepoint 26 makes contact with the contact 19 and the direction of rotationof the engine continues forward.

If it is desired to reverse the engine, the handle 30 is manipulated tomove the local contact member 25 on its pivot so that the contact point26 is lifted and the contact point 27 is forced down in contact with thedisk as shown in full lines in Fig. 3. It is assumed that when thistakes place the engine is running in the direction of arrow at. Thecontact point 27 now comes into engagement with the recurrently movingcontact member 19 a substantial distance before the piston has completedits compression stroke, the explosion takes place and the engine isinstantly reversed and driven back in the direction of arrow 6. It willthus be seen that by this rocking of the local contact member 25 on itspivot, the direction of rotation of the engine can be positively andcertainly reversed.

I prefer to make the whole support for the local contact movable, so asto be able to advance and retard the time of making contact. For thispurpose I may mount the ring 21 so that it can be swung, concentric tothe shaft 11, on the boss 38 of the machine, and I may provide shiftingand locking means, constructed, for example, as follows: The ring 21 issplit to form the projecting ends 39. A rod 40 with a flange ll isarranged to extend through the ends 39,

the'lower end 39 being screw-threaded and receiving the screw-threadedend 42 of the rod L0. The rod 40 extends up through a bearing 43 mountedon the plate 24 and is provided with the hand-wheel 44. WVhen thehand-wheel is turned to unscreu the screw 42, the ringQl is released atits ends suiiiciently to allow the whole support to be swung, and whenit is properly adjusted, the wheel 44 may again be turned to tighten upthe ends 39 and the ring 21 is bound around the boss 38. This adjustmentprovides for shifting the local contact for advancing and retarding thespark, and it will be seen that the spark can be advanced or retardedwhen the engine is running either forward or backward. The dotted linesin Fig. 3 show the local contact member in the position it occupies whenthe spark is retarded and the engine is reversed. The range throughwhich the local contact member 25 may be brought into contact with therecurrently moving contact member 19 in practice, when the member 25 isplaced normally vertically above the engine shaft as illustrated,extends from the position where such retarded spark contact is made, asindicated in dotted lines in Fig. 3, to a corresponding position on theother side of the vertical, and it is this portion of the path of thecontact traversed by the contact 19 during which effective electricalcontact is made and which must be a fixed path and be traversedrecurrently by the contact 19. So long as the contact 19 travels suchfixed path recurrently, its movement elsewhere is immaterial and it maytraverse any path in other parts of its movement. Such fixed path asshown is the arc of a circle, but it may have any other desired form andthe local contact may be shifted in any manner which will keep itadjacent to such fixed path and in position to make contact with thecontact 19 traversing the same.

In the type of ignition device illustrated herein, the shifting supportfor the local contact member is arranged vertica'lly when the engine isto be started either forward or backward so that when the handle 30 isup or down the contact made by the contact point on the local contactmember 25 in engagement is the same distance on either side from thevertical point or top center of the disk 20. The support should also beplaced in a vertical position before the direction of rotation of the.engine is to be reversed. This is desirable, as it is easy to determinesubstantially the vertical position of the support and such arrangementdoes away with guess work as to slowing up the engine to the properspeed for reversing, since the shifting of the support to a verticalposition retards the spark and automatically slows the engine down tothe proper number of revolutions at which the reversing operation shouldtake place.

It will be evident that multiple cylinder engines can be equippedwiththis ignition device by the simple expedient of providing the propernumber of contact devices connected for sparking each cylinder in propersequence, and by a similar construction of handle the multiple localcontacts can be actuated to engage the multiple recurrently movingcontacts.

It will be understood that other constructions can be employed withinthe scope of my claims, and that other arrangements of circuit thanthose illustrated may be resorted to for bringing about the operationsand functions enumerated herein without departing from the scope of myinvention.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim is 1. An ignitionapparatus for internal combustion engines comprising in combination arecurrently. moving contact member arranged to pass recurrently along afixed path of travel, and a local contact member mounted adjacent tosaid path of travel and adapted to engage the moving contact member atseparated points and to be out of engagement therewith at intermediatepoints in said fixed path of travel.

2. In an engine sparking circuit, a recurrently moving contact, asupport shiftable along the path traversed by the recurrently movingcontact, a contact member on said support and provided with separatedcontact making portions, and means for moving the last named contactmember on its support so as to bring the contact making portions thereofalternately into engagtement with said recurrently moving contac 3. Thecombination of an engine and its sparking circuit, with a contact devicein the circuit, the contact device consisting of a revolving contactoperated from the en? gine, a yoke supported adjacent to the re volvingcontact, and means for swinging the yoke tocause its ends to alternatelyengage the revolving contact.

1. The combination of an engine and its sparking circuit, with a contactdevice in the circuit, the contact device consisting of a revolvingcontact operated from the en gine, a yoke supported adjacent to therevolving contact, means for swinging the yoke to cause its ends toalternately engage the revolving contact, and means for looking the yokein its alternate positions.

5. The combination of an engine and its sparking circuit, with a contactdevice in said circuit, the contact device consisting of a recurrentlymoving contact operated from the engine, a shifting contact to engagethe moving contact, the shifting contact being disposed so that itengages the moving contact after the piston of the engine has completedits compression stroke, and means for actuating the shifting contact sothat it engages the moving contact before the completion of thecompression stroke.

6. An ignition device for internal combustion engines comprising arotary contact operated from the engine, a support, a yoke mounted onthe support and adapted to swing so that its ends can be alternatelybrought in contact with the revolving contact, means for shifting andlocking the yoke in its alternate positions, and a handle on theshifting and locking means for its manipulation.

7. An ignition device for internal combustion engines comprising arotary contact operated from the engine, a support, a yoke mounted onthe support and adapted to swing so that its ends can be alternatelybrought in contact with the revolving contact, means for shifting andlocking the yoke in its alternate positions, a handle on the shiftingand locking means for its nanipulation, and means for adjusting andsecuring the support in different positions.

8. An ignition device for internal combustion engines comprising anon-conducting disk operated from the engine shaft, a contact in thedisk, a support adjacent to the disk, a yoke swinging on the supportwith its ends adapted to alternately engage the disk and its contact,the disk being adapted to limit the movement of the yoke when it swings,means for locking the yoke in its alternate positions, and means forswinging the yoke.

9. An ignition device for internal combustion engines comprising anon-conducting disk operated from the engine shaft, a contact in thedisk, a support adjacent to the disk, a yoke swinging on the supportwith its ends adapted to alternately engage the disk and its contact,the disk being adapted to limit the movement of the yoke when it swings,means for locking the yoke in its alternate positions, means forswinging the yoke, the support being mounted to swing concentrically inits relation to the disk, and means for locking the support in differentpositions.

In testimony, that I claim the foregoing, I have hereunto set my handthis 14th day of April, 1913.

GEORGE H. GERE. -Witnesses:

WVM. H. CAMFIELD, M. A. JOHNSON.

Copies of this patent may be obtained for five cents each, by addressingthe Commissioner 01' Patents, Washington, D. 0."

